Zahav’s Silky Smooth Israeli Hummus

June 11, 2018 By justalittlebitofbacon 41 Comments

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Michael Solomonov is the owner of the restaurant Zahav and he has the secret to the most amazing silky, smooth Israeli hummus! Happily, he is willing to share that secret, so I can in turn bring the recipe to you. Just a warning: it is addictively good.

Several months ago I was listening to an interview on NPR with Michael Solomonov. I had never heard of him before, not living anywhere near Philadelphia (where he has his restaurant), but the interview talked at length about how tasty and smooth and amazing his hummus is, so I knew I had to try it.

How could I resist?

That’s right, I couldn’t! 🙂 And they knew what they were talking about. This is superior hummus. It’s creamy. It’s light. It’s great on wraps or as a dip.

I really can’t say enough good things about this hummus. Like most people I often buy hummus and enjoy the smoother hummus out there these days and sometimes I make hummus at home using cooked beans or canned beans. But I’ve never been able to buy or make the super creamy, silky hummus I’ve had out at good Middle Eastern restaurants. It was just never the same.

Until now!

How to Make Israeli Hummus

To make Israeli hummus, you can start by soaking chickpeas…or not. It’s up to you. My next section discusses the debate and my recipe includes directions and times for both soaked and unsoaked beans.

Either way, you are now going to cook the chickpeas along with the secret ingredient. Baking soda. Baking soda + overcooking the chickpeas will give you super smooth hummus. If you look at the photo below, you can see that the chickpeas are very soft and falling apart a bit. Don’t go too far though! You should still have recognizable beans, just soft ones.

Also, you are going to salt those beans when you are cooking them. Kenji says so. It will not make your chickpeas tough, but what it will do is flavor them from the inside out.

Once you have nice, soft, salted beans, it’s time to make the hummus.

Start by pureeing garlic and lemon juice and a little bit more salt in the food processor. Then let it sit and mellow for 10 minutes (mixing together garlic or onion with acid makes for a more mild flavor) before straining out the garlic and pouring the garlicky lemon juice back in the processor.

Next up is the second secret of ultra-creamy hummus. Lots of tahini! You will be using at least 1/3 cup, and I like the hummus up to 2/3 cup of tahini. Since you are using so much tahini, you may want to search out better brands. If you have a Middle Eastern or Greek import store in the area, that can be a good place to look, or you can order tahini online – two good brands I like are Soom Foods and 365 Organic Whole Foods.

Whip the tahini up with the lemon juice and add water or chickpea cooking liquid by the tablespoon until the tahini is light and smooth.

Now add the beans and the cumin. And process it all together for 4 minutes, add more water/cooking liquid until it is the texture and thickness you want.

Once your hummus is done, it’s time to scoop it into a bowl and top it with whatever you like on your hummus. A few suggestions are kalamata olives, parsley, olive oil, pine nuts, chickpeas, and paprika.

It’s safe to say I’ve become a little obsessed with this hummus. Since it’s soooo good! To the point that I had to figure out the best method to make it, and so I bought several bags of beans and tried stovetop (too fussy), oven (nice and easy), and instant pot (also easy and a bit faster). And looked into the soak vs. no soak debate.

My finale cooking times and directions are all in the recipe card, but now it’s time to talk about the debate…

Do You Need to Soak Dried Beans?

I come down on the side of no.

For some beans, like black beans and lentils. There isn’t even a debate. (Yes – Kenji again. The man knows his beans.) You should not soak these beans! They are thin skinned and there is no value, or even reduction in flavor and texture, when soaking.

What about other beans? Still no! (most of the time)

Yes, soaking will reduce the cooking time, and for very old beans which are especially dried out, it is helpful so that all the beans cook evenly, since some beans will dry out more than others over time.

However, the time reduction is really not worth having to remember to measure out the beans and soak them the night before. Let’s face it: how often have you forgotten and then couldn’t make whatever bean dish you wanted cook for dinner?

Even with all this info, a lot of sources still want you to soak your chickpeas. And maybe when you don’t add baking soda to the water, soaking is good (I have yet to test that variable), but I have found that chickpeas can stand with other beans and cook right from dry to creamy and soft.

That means, even for chickpeas, though I do have cooking directions for soaked chickpeas if you’re into that, I don’t bother soaking and just pop them in my oven or instant pot (depending on my mood), along with salt and baking soda. And pull out beautiful beans every time.

Note: If you are cooking kidney beans (either red or white) or dried fava (broad) beans, you do need to let the water come to a good boil and stay there for at least 10 minutes before you do anything else with them. These beans (esp. red kidneys) contain high concentrations of the toxin, phytohaemagglutinin, which is destroyed by boiling but activated by low heat. Once you boil, you’re good to go with any cooking method.

Here are a few other recipes for Mediterranean Dips:

If you try my recipe for Silky Smooth Israeli Hummus, I would love to hear from you in the comments with your experience and rating! You can connect with me by subscribing to my emails (see the form in the sidebar or below the recipe card), liking my FACEBOOK page, or by following me on PINTEREST.

– Happy Eating, Annemarie

Zahav's classic recipe for Israeli hummus bi tahini is the best homemade hummus you can make! It's silky, smooth, creamy, light, and addictively yummy.

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5 from 14 votes